Night Times
by Chinese Bakery
Summary: Three times Edward watched Bella sleep.


**Night Times**

Author: chinesebakery  
Pairing: Edward/Bella  
Summary: "She was the consenting victim to his voyeurism, his delightful little lamb, indulging wordlessly to his most bizarre inclinations. And she was as avidly curious of him." Three times Edward watched Bella sleep.  
Rating: K  
Spoilers: Nothing specific  
A/N: Thanks to becoolbec for the beta.

* * *

_I._

He wasn't used to questions being left unanswered. It had to be the reason why he couldn't stop visiting her at night. The curiosity was even stronger than the irresistible smell of her blood – that's what he liked to tell himself, at least. She puzzled him, in every way.

She looked so vulnerable, laying there with her throat exposed, and that alone should have been reason enough to leave and never come back.

And she _talked_ in her sleep. Those seemingly random words muttered in the dark weren't enough to reveal the mysterious meandering of her mind, but it felt like a little window to her mind had been accidentally left open, just for him. Hushed words, whispers, heartbeats, moans. All those intimate sounds affected him in a way he'd rather not acknowledge.

He went back, and again, and again. He couldn't stop himself from going back.

The first time she whispered his name, he thought he had been caught red-handed. The panic and the shame – _what was he doing?_ – overwhelmed him before he could start thinking. Before he could flee the room and disappear into the night, praying for her to think his ghostly presence had been nothing but a bad dream.

But her heartbeat was unmistakably calm, steady.

_Thump. Thump._

It didn't sound like the heart of a girl who had just found an intruder standing by her bed in the dead of night. There was none of the expected alarm, no surprise, no terror. She was still sound asleep, and she had just whispered her name.

"Edward." It sounded fabulous when she said it.

He couldn't describe her appeal, couldn't explain it to himself. It was more than her blood, more than her scent, more than her beauty. It was elusive and terrifying. It was endangering everyone.

And it really wasn't like him. He had never been reckless – actually, he was very much the opposite. Nothing about him and Isabella Swan made any sense. She was changing him in ways he didn't comprehend. But he kept going to her. Every night, he visited her, hoping to one day understand, and leave it all behind.

_II._

As time went by, he found he could never get enough of watching her sleep. It was his guilty pleasure, his addiction – she really was his brand of hard drug.

But everything was different now. She was the consenting victim to his voyeurism, his delightful little lamb, indulging wordlessly to his most bizarre inclinations. And she was as avidly curious of him.

Summer nights were the best. She would stay up late, reading, talking, _being_, and let him study her to his heart's content. To an extent, there relationship was very typical of adolescence. He had to battle with himself for self-control like any other teenager, only she was the one pressuring him on the most physical aspects of their relationship. He was always the one to pull away from the feverish kisses, always the one to stop her hands' explorations. Every slip of his self-control, she considered a personal victory.

But at night, everything was different. At night, he could allow himself to stare at the long, pale leg peaking out from the covers, without any immediate consequence.

_Thump, thump. _The sound of her heart, the most wonderful thing he'd ever heard.

On a night like this, he could let his fingers travel over her exposed shin, almost grazing the skin, close enough to feel the warmth radiating from her fragile body without disrupting her sleep. He could count the scars, study the thin white lines where the skin had broken and her blood spilled. His Bella, so accident prone.

_Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump. _Even at night, she didn't play fair.

"Bella," he whispered, not quite managing to repress a grin.

He could see her face, her eyes still closed, and the small smile threatening to appear at the corner of her mouth. She wasn't much of an actress, really.

"I know you're awake, love," he informed her, and his fingers brushed the inside of her knee. She jumped and giggled as he touched a ticklish spot, grabbing his hand to still it.

"Are you trying to _molest_ me?" she asked, faking concern.

"Merely turning the tables," he chuckled, letting her pull him to her. At night, he didn't have it in him to fight her.

_III._

He had never truly doubted the existence of hell, but it had only been a vague notion, a conceptual junction of pain and retribution, a philosophic notion rather than a _feeling_. But this – the helplessness, the horror, the overwhelming guilt – felt real. So real.

_Thump_. Pause. _Thump_.

The faint, laborious beating was torture to his ears. In turn, each of his siblings had tried to lure him out of the room, there was nothing he could do now – she couldn't feel his presence in her comatose state. But nothing could make him miss the last moments of her life.

The silence was the worst. He had prepared for everything but for her body growing silent.

"Edward."

He didn't acknowledge Carlisle's presence at the door. He blamed him, too. He blamed everyone. They had done this to her. How could he ever have agreed to this?

_Is she in pain?_

"I don't think so," he said coldly. There had been so much pain before. Stronger than the drugs, stronger than her will, stronger than her naive resolve to spare him. He wondered if time would erase the memories of his beautiful Bella, contorted in agony, screaming his name. Screaming for mercy. Did he even want to forget? Of all his crimes, this one was unquestionably the worse. And all he could do was sit and watch her life fade away.

He resented Carlisle for his professional detachment as he pulled him away from her and sat at the edge of the bed, pressing a thumb to her wrist to feel her barely existent blood pressure. Checking her perfusion as if she was yet another patient.

_It's almost over._

Edward nodded, but wouldn't meet his surrogate father's eye. When he heard the door close, he knelt back by the bed and watched Bella's livid face, her blueing lips.

Her dying little hand felt too cold in his. He wondered if he could press it as strongly as he needed to, now. No, not yet, but soon. After he heard her heart beat for the very last time. After the guilt receded and he could look her in the eye again. Soon enough

_Epilogue_

She never slept anymore, she didn't need to. The sound of her heart was nothing but a distant memory, as was the charming flush of her cheeks, the warmth of her lips, the scent of her blood. Adjusting had been complicated for both, but it was behind them now.

But he found other things to love about her, almost everyday. She made everything interesting, and starting over every few years had never been so fun. She was his best friend, his hunting partner, his traveling companion, his confidant, his wife.

He was unsure, at first, more than he would ever admit to. But being proven wrong could be spectacularly satisfying.


End file.
